


the only thing you save

by akelios



Category: Dark Knight Rises (2012)
Genre: Abuse of Authority, Alpha/Beta/Omega Dynamics, Alternate Universe, Attempted Rape/Non-Con, Attempted Sexual Assault, Blood and Injury, Drugs, F/M, Fictional Religion & Theology, M/M, Mating Cycles/In Heat, Murder, Original Character Death(s), Rape/Non-con Elements, Sexual Assault
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-09-01
Updated: 2015-09-01
Packaged: 2018-04-18 10:38:33
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Rape/Non-Con
Chapters: 2
Words: 15,221
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/4702973
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/akelios/pseuds/akelios
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There's only one sentence on the books for an omega like him.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> Notes, notes, so many notes. 
> 
> First, this grew out of a prompt at the Dark Knight Rises kink meme that I promptly lost for two years. Now that I've found the prompt again I'm not sure it fills it. But here we are. 
> 
> Second, the title is from Nickleback's 'This Means War'. I'm not proud of this fact. But, like the prompt that started this, it stuck in my head and the story has been called this for so long I can't go changing it now.
> 
> Third, there is no actual sex in this fic. None. Lots of attempts, some very heavy touching by people who have no business touching John, but no on screen sex. Lots of violence though. And assaults on John's person. 
> 
> One day I will write a fic where nothing bad happens to John. 
> 
> This is not that fic.
> 
> I have warned for everything I can think of but please, if you see a warning that I missed, let me know and I will add it.
> 
> As always, beta'd by forestgreen. Any remaining mistakes and awfulness are mine.
> 
> A last fact that will surprise no one, this fic is absolutely Bane/Blake pre-slash in my head. Because I have a type.

John opens his eyes to an unfamiliar ceiling. His head spins, and John has to close his eyes again quickly, pressing his head down into a thin pillow as he fights to keep his breathing even. His hands fumble together, fingers squeezing until it nearly hurts to distract him from the too slick roll of his stomach. He takes a deep breath, hoping for cool air to help clear his aching head but when he breathes in the air is sour and thick with an unnatural humidity that chokes him on the inhale. 

It reminds John of meat that's been left out just a little too long, rotting but not _rotten_ , not yet. Something that, in his worst days in the Narrows, he would have been happy to eat. Those days are years in the past now though, and the thickness of that rot in the back of his mouth is enough to send John rolling off of the bed and stumbling blindly for a bathroom.

His jeans start to slide down his hips, half undone and loose. John clutches at them with one hand, the other clenched in a fist against his mouth, as if it will help keep the churning of his stomach under control. 

He slams into a wall on his way, eyes only half open against the sharpness of the light filtering through the closed curtains over the windows behind him. John doesn't bother to reach for the light switch when he finds the bathroom, sliding gratefully to his knees and losing what little is in his stomach in a foul rush that leaves relief behind it.

John flushes away the mess and slides down further to rest his head against the cool side of the tub for a few minutes. He's in a hotel room, that much is clear even through the pounding in his head and the smothering confusion that he can't quite push through. 

He forces himself to his feet once he feels like he can stand without collapsing and examines himself in the mirror, using the dim light that reaches into the bathroom from the front of the hotel. John's eyes are bloodshot, a bruise forming along the right side of his face. Dried blood flakes off his upper lip when he reaches up to probe the bruised and swollen ridge of his nose. His t-shirt is spotted with blood along the collar and his jeans, when he works up the energy to pull them back up and button them, feel dirty beneath his fingers.

“Shit.” Was he in a fight? John can't remember, but it would explain the injuries he can see and the soreness that he can feel along his ribs every time he breathes and the torn skin of his knuckles. It would also explain why he's in a hotel and not back at the apartment he shares with two of the other cadets. Getting a hotel room is a lot easier than getting a cab to pick you up after a good fight. 

They charge extra if they think you're going to bleed all over the seats.

He flips on the water and splashes at his face, drinks some from his cupped hands and spits it out, trying to clean the taste out of his mouth. John pours more cold water over his face, the chill seeping through his skin and easing some of the pain in his cheek and jaw. The a/c unit kicks on in the main room with a rattling snarl and John closes his eyes, struggling to remember anything from the night before.

He drags up flashes of a bar, dark wood gleaming under faded yellow lights and the warm smells of burgers and beer. Laughter and heat and the too close press of bodies against his own. John grinds the heels of his hands against his eyes and groans at the spike of pain it causes. He thinks he can feel the ghost of teeth biting at his lips, dragging over the arch of his throat, but there's nothing clear. No faces, just shattered fragments that fade in and out before he can get a grasp on them.

The air washes around John, raising goosebumps on his bare arms. The smell, half rotten and foul, wafts back into the bathroom and John has to remember to breathe shallowly through his mouth to keep from being sick again. Just his luck that he'd checked into a room where some poor rat decided to die in the vents. John turns off the water and shuffles out of the bathroom, patting down his sticky jeans with hands that shake and fumble.

His wallet is still in his pocket, but his cell phone is missing. John curses under his breath and starts to search for it. The room isn't very large, two beds, a broken down dresser bearing a television that looks like it might shock John if he tries to turn it on. The nightstand is empty of everything except for a Gideon Bible with a garish, blood red smile scrawled onto the cover. Even the phone is missing, a broken tail of cord showing that it must have been there until recently at least.

“Jesus. I couldn't have found a better rat hole to crash in?” Both beds are missing their covers, the green sheets of the one that John had woken on clashed with the smears of dark red blood from where John has twisted and turned in sleep.

John spots the missing comforters in a heap between the second bed and the door, a garish mound of orange and green that sets John's head to pounding harder. 

The smell is worse the closer John gets to the mound of bedding and John finds his shuffling steps slowing even further. He can taste the rotting meat in the back of his mouth again and John's skin prickles, his stomach rolling. John gets a flash of phantom hands against his stomach, pushing up beneath his shirt, and his skin goes cold and clammy. 

His hand is shaking as he reaches for the edge of the comforter. John isn't surprised when it resists his pull, the cloth sticking to something beneath it. There's a sound that isn't a sound, the comforter pulling free a stitch at a time until it breaks loose all at once, dragging down to reveal a bloody red mass. John drops the comforter, stumbling back until his shoulders hit the wall, his head hitting with a muffled thump.

John's throat is tight, his head swimming. He stares at the thing still half covered by the bedding until it starts to make sense, until he can trace the smashed lines of a nose, the shattered ridge of a cheekbone. There's dark hair and the dull curve of something rounded resting in the middle of the shattered face. 

He's banging on the next rooms' door, yelling for them to call 9-1-1 before he can think better of it.

\---

“Can any of you tell me why Maria Goretti is a saint?” Father Reilly smiles from his place at the front of the classroom, waiting.

John ducks his head down and scratches at the scars of his own name on the desk, gouging the 'R' with his unbent paperclip. He hopes that someone else actually read the homework, that the Father will call on anyone but him because he doesn't care who Maria Goretti was or what she did to get the shining halo over her head.

There's a soft shuffle of movement and John peeks out from beneath the dark tangle of his hair to see that Terry has his hand up. 

“Mr. McGinnis?”

“Because she died a virgin.” Terry blushes at the round of snickers that ruffle through the class, but clears his throat and speaks again, more loudly. “She died rather than let an alpha she wasn't married to knot her.”

“No, I'm afraid that's not quite it.” Reilly begins to pace a little in front of the class and John keeps scratching at his name, widening the 'o' in 'John' until it's a gaping mouth, the wood pale beneath the varnish and years of other lost kids scribbling on it. “It's a common misunderstanding though. We place a lot of importance on staying virginal, don't we?”

The kids around John shift uneasily in their desks. He starts to carve a bird over his name, nothing more than a stretched out, flattened 'm', but it's the best John can do.

“It is important to stay pure until marriage, of course, but Saint Maria Goretti was being raped. There is no sin on the victim of such a terrible crime. The only one to blame is the rapist.” 

There's more shifting in seats, kids ducking their heads and sharing looks. The Father says nothing, lets them pass their little secret messages on in glances and gestures. John palms the paper clip when the Father's gaze passes over him and does his best to look innocent.

It's not his best look.

“So if it's not her virginity that is important, why was Maria Goretti a saint?” Silence reigns in the classroom after this question. No one will meet the Father's eyes and after a few seconds Father Reilly smiles and rolls his shoulders in a soft shrug. “When Maria Goretti was dying, her concern was for the soul of her rapist. She knew that in her innocence she had nothing to fear from death, as terrible as it was for her to be taken in such a way and so young. But the man who had attacked her, he was damned unless he repented. 

“Maria Goretti forgave the man who killed her. Not only that, but she was ultimately the instrument of his salvation. Her forgiveness, the mercy of God that shone through her soul, allowed this sinner to be saved.” Father Reilly's face settles into serious lines, the smile fading from his lips. “Forgiveness is the source of our faith. Our salvation. Without God the Father's forgiveness, we would all be condemned. Without Jesus' mercy in coming to us we would have no hope. This is why we must look to the example of Maria Goretti and the other saints who have been held up to us and learn from them. We must learn to forgive the sins and crimes against us in our hearts.”

“What if we can't?” John's voice surprises even himself. He slumps down into his seat, the familiar anger burning in his body. 

“Can't? Or won't?” Father Reilly's voice is kind.

John pictures the men who came to take his father away that last time. He remembers the smirk of the drunk driver who had killed his mother as he walked out of the courtroom a free man. John bites his lip and doesn't answer. He knows that can't and won't are the same thing sometimes.

\---

The investigation is a joke.

John makes mistakes along the way, talks to the detectives without even a public representative but he's freaking out at first, there was a dead _body_ in the room with him and then he just keeps being stupid because he believes in the system. He believes that they all want justice. That the men he wants to call brothers in arms only want the truth, no matter where that takes them.

He believes himself right into a cell and a trial for murder.

The trial is a sham.

John knows that from the moment his own attorney looks into his eyes. John can see the condemnation there. The belief that he is a killer, an omega hopped up on drugs and desperate for any alpha who would have him. 

It doesn't matter that the only drug they could find in his system was Ivy's Kiss, the street version of a drug originally developed to help omegas who had irregular heat cycles. It doesn't matter that John's attorney has an expert witness testifying that the only reason for the levels of the drug to be that high was if it was used as a date rape aide. That it explains John's memory loss and the confusion of hormones surging through his system even months later. The prosecution has witnesses of their own, men and women who testify that John has a history of violence, that he overdosed himself accidentally. 

None of it really matters.

What matters is that John is an omega from the wrong side of the tracks – there are at least four people on the jury old enough to remember when the street John grew up on was still called Crime Alley – and that the man he's accused of murdering was a well respected instructor at the Gotham Police Academy. 

A stand up man from a decent family. 

A man with an omega and three kids at home who would never know their alpha thanks to John.

The family doesn't attend the trial, or the sentencing. It's a small thing to be grateful for, but at least John won't have to look into the kids faces and see his own pain staring back out at him.

He's not surprised at the guilty verdict. 

And there's only one sentence on the books for an omega like him.

\---

“Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. It's been-”

“Eight months since your last visit.” Father Reilly smiles and John finds himself wrapped in a hug. It takes a second for John to hug back, even now.

“Sorry. I've just been...” John waves his hands. “Busy.”

“Oh, I remember. Even in my day seminary was maddening. But you're on break now, so you have time for a little visit with the boys?”

“I-” John looks at the happiness in the Father's eyes and bites his tongue. “Yeah. I can hang with the kids. But we're having dinner later, alright?”

“Of course, of course.”

The kids are great, as always, swamping him and demanding stories and basketball games and a couple of self defense lessons for the older boys, the ones who aren't ashamed to be seen learning from an omega. John finds himself wishing that the seminary was closer, that he'd been able to visit more often. It takes him a second to remember that it won't be a problem anymore.

It's hours before dinner, before the kids are all in their dorms studying or making a bad attempt at pretending to study. By the time John sits down with Father Reilly it's almost ten at night and he could gladly eat the scarred old table as well as the chicken and dumplings steaming on his plate.

They talk for a while, meaningless babble that fills up the empty spaces of the room, making it friendly and close and the next best thing to a home that John has ever known. John keeps opening his mouth to start, to tell the Father, but something else always comes out, another story about an instructor or a classmate, another distraction.

They're both tired, aching from laughter and curled around their second glasses of wine, when John works up to it.

“I quit.” 

“No shame in that. You know we don't hold to drunkenness around here.” Father Reilly reaches for John's half full glass with a smile on his lips.

“No.” John grabs the glass and downs whats left. “I quit seminary. I'm leaving the priesthood. Well. You know what I mean.”

There's a slow blink from Father Reilly, confusion filling his face.

“But- but why? I thought you liked St. Joseph's?”

“I did. I do. It's great. I just...” John wishes for something stronger than the wine, knows better than to look for it. “It's not- The sacrifice. The service to the Trinity. It's not in me.”

“Have you found an alpha? You know the church makes exceptions, the Eastern Rite would have you. You wouldn't have to leave if you bonded with your alpha before you took your vows.”

John snorts and nearly chokes on his own laughter. “No alpha would have such an awful omega, and we both know it.” 

Father Reilly shakes his head, starts to lean forward to say something but John cuts him off. 

“You know what I mean. There's no mysterious alpha sweeping me off my feet. I'm just not cut out for the priesthood.”

“Then what will you do?”

“I'm going to be a cop.”

“In Gotham?” Father Reilly crosses himself when John nods in reply. “Father have mercy. We're going to need the brandy.”

\---

Hope is a dangerous emotion.

John knows this, he's known it since he was five, when the hope of his mother ever coming home curdled and died in his chest, turning into an aching hole that has never gone away. 

Father Reilly had always said that it was love that was the most dangerous, that could turn people into the most terrible monsters even as it raised others to the most glorious heights. John had never been able to make him understand that it was the _hope_ of that love being returned that was the dangerous part. That it was only when that hope turned sour and black that the love went bad.

Hope is insidious. Futile. It kills more surely than anything John has ever seen.

It's why, even knowing in the depths of his soul that he's doomed, John feels a spark of hope with their first appeal. 

And the second.

Even with the third, John holds onto the thin certainty that someone will have to realize the mistake that's been made. That he's innocent. 

That he's the victim.

When the third appeal fails, as John tells himself he damn well should have known it would, John tells his lawyer to stop it. 

Stop everything. 

No more appeals, no more pleas for leniency. 

He ignores the visits from reporters and people from the Omega Rights Coalition. 

Father Reilly keeps coming, but John makes sure they talk about everything and anything but his case. He can't bear to continue trying to make the Father see reality.

John embraces the truth, even if everyone around him continues to lie to themselves.

There's no justice in Gotham.

\---

John loses his virginity to the alpha down the hall. 

It's a romance cliché in action, except for all the ways it's not.

Her name is Kori and she's brilliant, half way through getting her Masters in International Human Rights. They meet on campus, friends of friends and end up arguing theology until the exhausted coffee shop employees kick them out. 

They continue the discussion every time they meet, which happens more and more often until it's obvious to them both that they're actively seeking one another out. It only gets worse when Kori starts to room with Donna and Raven, putting her only a few doors down from John's own cramped apartment. 

John and Kori run into each other on the bus. In the laundry room. They exchange cups of sugar or flour like they're actually living in an old sitcom and they ignore their friends knowing grins and the not so subtle attempts to get them to date. They come to an understanding one Sunday morning when the elevator gets stuck on the way up from the basement. It's only for a few minutes, but it's long enough for the scent of John's impending heat to fill the small space.

Kori smiles and John shrugs and it comes out in a tangle of words John is too embarrassed to think about later that they like one another but not enough for that. 

But there's being mated and there's having a good time and in spite of what Father Reilly and the Church would like to believe, the second doesn't require the first.

They come together deliberately, between John's heats, without making a big deal of it. John's not sure what to expect, and he never manages to fumble out the words that he's never done this before because it's just not important when Kori is naked in front of him, skin seeming to glow in the afternoon sunlight coming through his windows. Her hair is a curtain of fire around them when she lays him out on his narrow, creaking bed and it feels like the whole world narrows down to just the two of them.

It's better than good, it's wonderful, it's more than John could have ever imagined in his craziest heat dreams. It's not perfect. John elbows Kori in the stomach at one point and the bites on his shoulder really mess up his aim for a couple of days. They might, though no one can prove anything, have rolled off of the bed and smashed into a Lego set on the floor at one point.

They do it again and again, always making sure to dodge John's heats. They're friends and that's all they want to be.

Their relationship is the open secret of the year, and it never goes any further than that. In spite of hints and attempts by everyone they know, at the end of the year Kori moves out, moves on, leaves Gotham for good. 

She calls once in a while, regales John with tales of legal battle and some of the horrors and wonders she sees during her internship. Eventually the calls stop, and then the emails, and then there's nothing but the occasional bump into one another on Facebook. 

It's best that way. 

They were never what the other one needed long term anyway.

\---

John knows his execution date is getting close when they start doping his food.

He's in solitary, for his own protection, which just means that it's only the guards who kick his ass and not the other inmates. John has long since stopped listening when his lawyer talks, unable to take the thin veneer of sympathy the man tries to paste over his words, half-hearted as it is. The man isn't a very good liar. He takes it badly when John tries to suggest he should find himself another career.

If it was possible John would stop letting his lawyer visit at all, but soon it won't be a problem.

John doesn't notice the drugs at first. It isn't until he starts waking up in the middle of the night covered in sweat and gasping for cool air that he suspects. It's like the build up to his heat, but weeks too early and it escalates too quickly to be natural. 

The guards just laugh when he says something. The prison doctor shrugs and babbles on about how they need to build up his levels slowly, to make sure his body doesn't go into toxic shock. Trick it into thinking the heat is natural.

The doctor seems to be more concerned about how long it takes John to stop laughing at the irony than he is at what they're doing to John. 

John starts refusing the food the guards bring him. 

He knows there are protocols for prisoners who refuse to eat. 

They don't follow any of them. 

There's no attempt to convince John to eat, no psychologist or falsely friendly new guard to coax John into swallowing his medicine like a good omega. The guards cuff him, pin him to the floor of his cell and hold him still so the doctor can inject the cocktail of drugs and hormones into his arm.

John's dreams are fever sweet, a tangle of memories and fantasies. Kori's golden, warm skin sliding over his own as she ruts into him, her voice rising in laughing joy. Jason's teeth at the back of his neck, almost hard enough to draw blood, scarred hands running along his sides, growls hot and delicious against the skin between his teeth. 

He wakes up to sticky, tangled sheets and his own hand still working restlessly between his legs. He's slick and open and aching with the desire to be filled. John grits his teeth and forces himself to stop, to pin his hands beneath the thin pillow behind his head and wait for the groaning, near painful desire to pass.

\---

John's never sure if the other kids realize that some of the guests at the orphanage are weird. None of them ever say anything about it, but then neither does John, once he figures it out so maybe they're all just trying to keep the secret.

John only figures it out because he likes looking through Father Reilly's old things, flipping through the pictures and imagining the stories of the people in them. The strange tunnels filled with the bones of the dead, clearly the haunts of vampires and other monsters of the night. Rooms that are filled with mirrors or gold, palaces for the fairy kings and queens of old.

He's pretty sure the Father knows he does it, sneaks in to the Father's rooms when he's teaching lessons or out visiting shut ins. John sometimes finds certain books open, trying a little too hard to be casual. But they never talk about it and so John likes to pretend that he's sneaky enough to never be caught.

The mosques and temples and markets come alive in John's imagination, populated with men and women whose lives are perfect and free and completely different from the dark hell of Gotham. John makes up stories about these wild places for the younger kids back in the dorms, dragging bits and pieces of movies and kids stories he half remembers, flying carpets and vampires mingling with helpful spirits and forests that move with a life of their own.

John is lost in reading a book about Egypt, the pictures so vibrant that John can almost feel the heat of the desert radiating against his down turned face when the lock on the door clicks. He doesn't have time to think, just moves and finds himself in the bottom of Father Reilly's old record cabinet, the book clutched to his chest as he holds the door closed with the tips of his fingers.

He recognizes the Father's footsteps, his voice calm and steady through the muffling wood. There are others there too, a mix of voices that whisper and stutter. It's hard to hear what they say, John's heart is pounding so hard in his chest, but he recognizes the sound of fear beneath the murmur of their words. He catches enough to figure out that the people are talking about leaving, as they sit down and eat whatever Father Reilly scrounges up in his small kitchen.

John shifts and stretches out when he can, his arms and legs cramping in the small space. He keeps hoping that they'll get tired and go, go back to their homes and the Father to bed so John can slip out and back to the dorms before anyone figures out he's out of bed again.

But they keep talking and talking, and someone cries off and on, a sound that sends phantom pains through Johns back and shoulders. He hunches in on himself, trying to ignore the ghost of his father's fist in his stomach and then he's waking up. 

The people are gone, as is the Father, and there's morning light filtering through the little windows in Father Reilly's study when John crawls out of his hiding spot. He scrambles down to the dining hall as soon as he figures the coast is clear and joins the rest of the kids in time to wolf down some eggs and toast.

He looks around for Father Reilly's guests, half a thought to seeing who had been crying the night before, but they're nowhere to be seen. The Father is at his usual spot, with the sisters at the far table, but there's no sign of any strangers.

John shrugs it off, nearly forgets about it only the Father seems to never leave his rooms for the next week. John gets frustrated, he can feel the hours slipping by when he could be reading, could be living a million other lives than the one he has now, but every time he starts to head down the hall to the Father's rooms someone is there to stop him.

He gets close enough late one night to hear voices beyond the Father's locked door, angry and pleading all at the same time and then Sister Michael has him by the back of his shirt and he has detention for three weeks for being out of bed after curfew. 

John serves his detention with the younger sisters, helping them with the cleaning and the cooking around the home. He also helps them load a couple of small suitcases into the grocery truck, earning himself a ruffling head pat which he hates from the driver. The old man also gives John a fresh peach, which is a much better reward.

John's young, but he's not stupid. He doesn't need to hang around to see two strange men climb into the back of the grocery truck and huddle down among the half empty crates to figure out who the suitcases belong to. He does, of course, because he can and because if he didn't find things out for himself no one would ever tell him. 

He doesn't figure out why the two omegas have to be smuggled out of Gotham until he's older.

\---

“John.” Father Reilly's voice is hardly more than a whisper and John knows that he must look like shit, more than normal anyway, to get that tone out of the unflappable priest.

“It's fine. It's fine.” John clenches his fists and does his best to ignore the itching under his skin, the way the prison issue jumpsuit is heavy and scratchy. He paces back and forth beneath the rooms one tiny air vent, the heat of the air anywhere else unbearable. “They just-” He jerks his shoulders in an abortive shrug, unsure what to say. 

“Oh, son.” The Father cross the room, as if he's going to take John in his arms and John jerks back, shaking his head. Father Reilly moves away, settles himself in one of the uncomfortable chairs in the middle of the room, his face a study in pain. “They- I got a call that you wanted to see me?”

He makes it a question, giving John an out.

“No. Yeah. I-” The air from the vent shifts and there's a hint of some alphas scent, enough to send a shiver skittering down John's spine and he nearly runs away from the cool air of the vent, escaping. “I need to confess. And then- extreme unction. It's gonna be soon. And I don't want-”

Even as he speaks John questions himself, unsure why it feels so important to have this. It feels half ridiculous in the face of what will happen, but the idea has lodged itself in John's fever slick brain and he hasn't been able to get past it.

“Come here.” 

John throws himself into the other chair, fingers tapping out a maddening rhythm against his thighs, one leg jittering with the effort of holding the rest of him still.

“I trust you haven't forgotten how to begin?” Father Reilly pulls his own chair closer, until he can bow his head next to John's and speak quietly to him.

“Forgive me Father, for I have sinned. It's been four years since my last confession.” John crosses himself, the familiar movement awkward and convulsive as a bead of sweat rolls down his cheek. “I-”

“Pardon me, John, but I must confess something first.” The Father's voice is nearly a whisper, the smell of his cologne burning John's lungs. “I have lied to the authorities of this facility. I have suborned men and women to help me break the corrupt laws of this land. I am...unwilling to render unto Caesar that which is Caesar's.”

“What?” John frowns, starts to pull away from the Father but Reilly's hand is suddenly on the back of John's neck and he freezes, the touch of even another omega too intimate to break off. 

“They'll take you to Robinson Park tomorrow evening. You'll be tied out and left there for whatever poor excuse for a human being comes by.”

“I _know_ that! That's why I want- I don't think they'll let me live, Father.” John digs his fingers into his thigh. 

“No, they won't.” Father Reilly takes John's fist in his hand, forces him to unclench, to remember to breathe. “One of the guards on your final detail is a friend. He is going to make sure that you will be able to untie yourself. Wait until they've left, John, are you listening? Wait until the guards are gone, they don't stick around for the bastards, too dangerous for them. When you're alone, get free. Run. Head east, toward Wayne Tower. You can see it even over the trees. There'll be a truck waiting for you at the road.

“We'll get you out of Gotham. There are places-”

“Father! I can't...you don't...” John's head swims, trying to keep up. 

“They are going to hurt you John. They are going to rape you and it doesn't matter if it's tomorrow night or years from now, one of those creatures that dares call itself a human being is going to kill you because they can. And there are people in this city who will cheer them on.

“I can't sit by and watch this happen. Let me help you. Please.”

\---

The look Sister Raphael gives John as she cleans up the blood and scrapes on his face reminds him of his dad. It's more than disappointment, it's like he's offended her down to her core. But she's at least nicer than his dad ever was. She patches him up, even if she doesn't smile and offer him a piece of candy like she usually does. There's no screaming, no thrown bottles of whatever his dad had been drunk on at the moment, and John knows that he doesn't have to run to save what's left of his skin. 

John's not sure if that makes the slippery sick feeling of shame better or worse. 

At least he could get angry at his dad. 

The Sister escorts him to Father Reilly's office when she's done, like she thinks he can't be trusted not to run off and lick his wounds in private.

To be fair, she's not wrong.

The Father takes one look at the two of them and John swears he can feel the sigh down to his bones, the way Father Reilly sets his pen down like he's just exhausted and John's bruised face is one thing too many to deal with.

Sister Raphael relays the whole story in words that feel bitten off and jagged as they fall around John's ears and he is not going to cry, it's just sweat stinging in his eyes as he stares at the battered front of Father Reilly's big desk. There's silence once the Sister leaves, the door closing behind her hard enough to make John jerk a little in his chair.

“So.” Father Reilly taps the fingers of one hand on the desk, the sound muffled by whatever papers he was working on. “Would you like to tell me what happened?”

John shrugs and slides further down in the chair. “You heard.”

“Yes, but now I want to hear what you think happened.”

“Wilson's a jack- a jerk.” John narrows his eyes and pictures the other boy, big and laughing as he reached for John, like he had any right. “He tried to grab me at lunch. I said no.” 

“You broke three of his teeth.” 

“He was trying to-” John shakes his head and forces himself to sit up, to meet the Father's eyes. “He thinks because he's an alpha he can just grab any omega he looks at and they won't do a damn thing but roll over for him. I said no. Wilson's lucky I didn't break his jaw.”

“John. You have the right to say no. You have the right to defend yourself. But you were in the middle of a crowded room with teachers and staff right there. All you needed to do was call out. Not beat another student bloody.”

“He'd have just come back and gotten me later. This way maybe he leaves me alone. Too much trouble.” John doesn't let himself think about the other option, where Wilson comes to find him in the middle of the night with some of his pack of baby alphas and gets his revenge. John's used to watching his own back. Nothing's changed.

“Do you know why our Lord came to us as an omega, John?”

“Because He's the Omega?” John rolls his eyes, unable to stop himself. 

“To show us the power in sacrifice, in submitting. In letting oneself be seen as weak when you are really the strong one.” 

John snorts and tucks his legs up under himself.

“Have you ever arm wrestled an alpha your own age?”

“No.” John blinks, confused, a frown stretching the cuts on his lip.

“I think, if you could ever find one willing to do it, that you would find that you're a good deal stronger than them. Do you know why?”

“Because I get in a lot of fights?”

John's sure he doesn't imagine the half-smothered snort of laughter from the Father.

“That certainly helps. But it's because you are an omega, John. Your body is made, wonderfully made, to endure the rigors of your heats. Of child birth, when that time comes. You are- all omegas are, stronger than they ever realize. In the days before the first covenant, omegas would often maim the alphas who mated them in the madness of their heats. It wasn't until Jesus, our Lord, God the Omega came that the sacrificial nature of omegahood was truly understood.

“He came as the strongest of us all and when He was attacked He yielded. He yielded to torment and to death. Not only to save us, but to show us that our salvation was in the refusal to do violence, in greeting a sword with the love of God and submission to the way that He has ordered the world.”

“Alphas on top, omegas on their knees, right?”

“That's not-”

“If we're so strong, so _wonderful_ , how come alphas treat us like shit?” John's anger burns in his chest, makes his words burst from him. “God the _Father_ , God the _Alpha_ wants it this way. Makes omegas strong just so alphas can feel better about grinding them into the dirt?

“It's bullshit.”


	2. Chapter 2

\---

John doesn't sleep the night before his execution. Everything is too hot, too cold, too tight. 

The guard who collects his tray smirks and offers John some liquid refreshment, his nostrils flaring at the thick scent of John's burgeoning heat. He's not crude enough to actually take his dick out but he does palm it through his uniform pants, staring steadily at John. 

John smiles and flips him off, pretending that neither of them can see how bad his hands shake as he does it.

The lights go off in John's cell almost as soon as the guard leaves with a snarled curse. It's hours too early for lights out. He doesn't know if it's a punishment for not sucking cock like a good little omega or if it's just what they do the night before they kill you. 

It doesn't matter. 

He curls around one of the pillows on his bunk and runs Father Reilly's plan through his mind like a rosary, holding on to each word as his body continues to betray him. 

By the time morning comes John is exhausted. There are dark circles under his eyes when he gets up to splash cold water over his face. His heat is no longer a disaster on the horizon, but right there, beginning to fill him up. John finds himself dragging his hands down his stomach, reveling in the pressure, the feeling of flesh against flesh. 

He stops himself with a groan, and settles onto the edge of his cot to wait. His whole body is practically vibrating with the need to move by the time he hears the first signs of life on the rest of the floor. John flexes his hands, skin stinging where his nails have dug into the meat of his palms.

Time to begin.

When the morning guards' rounds bring him to John's door John is curled up on the cot, jerking off with his back to the door, as if there's any privacy left in his world. John's slick and throbbing when he reaches back, the pajama pants and sheets soaked through and messy. He stops when he hears the click of the observation window behind him, lets out a soft groan as if fighting with himself for that little bit of control.

It scares John how close the pretense is to the truth.

Whichever guard it is laughs and there are a few seconds where John doesn't know if they're going to come in.

Doesn't know if he wants them to or not.

But the window slams shut and John listens as the heavy footsteps move away. 

No one else comes to his cell.

There's no breakfast, no lunch. John knows, in a distracted sort of way, when the times for these things come and go. He can hear the cells around him receiving their meals, the chatter muted except for the occasional shout of an inmate offering to help John with his problem. 

John laughs quietly to himself and prays that no more guards come to offer him anything at all. He's not sure he'd be able to stop himself from taking them up on it.

He drinks from the tap when he finds his throat getting dry, lays on the damp morass of his cot and imagines Father Reilly's face behind closed eyes. John might sleep, in tiny snatches, but there's no rest. It's late when they come for him, two guards and the doctor. John scents them as they come in, half habit, half helpless wondering interest. All he gets is the sweet pine scent of betas, soothing and cool. 

John doesn't fight them, not when they haul him off the cot to strip him out of his sweat soaked and stained clothes. Not when the doctor examines him one last time, declaring him healthy enough for his sentence to be carried out. There's meant to be another shot, the last one, and John just watches the doctor out of the corner of his eye. 

The doctor, expression far from detached, nostrils flaring as he rummages thoughtfully around in his bag. John leans drunkenly against the guards grips, body loose and hot with need. He rolls his hips and moans, bare skin dragging over the rough material of the closest guards uniform. His own scent rises up to choke him and the next groan is half-conscious as he leans in closer to the guard to his right, the one whose hands are going to leave vivid bruises all along Johns arm.

“Jesus.” The guard John is almost rutting against loses his cool and beta or not there's an answering flush of arousal filling his face. He lets go of John's arm, one hand coming up to the back of John's neck, grip still hard and punishing as he wrenches John's head back. John grits his teeth through the throb of pain and whimpers, pushing his hips forward into the hand that fumbles between his legs, broad fingers rough and pinching at soft sensitive flesh before thrusting into his slick opening. The guards arm brushes against John's cock as he moves his wrist in harsh, jerky movements. 

“The fuck you think you're doing, Frank?” The other guard sounds incredulous but he makes no move to stop his friend. 

John peers at the doctor through half closed eyes. He is just watching, needle capped and waiting in one hand loose at his side. John cants his hips more, his legs slipping just a little wider and the doctors dark eyes flick down the length of his body.

“Hell, I don't think he needs any more.” Frank pulls his fingers from John with a grating laugh. He wraps his hand, slick with John's own arousal, around John's cock and squeezes. The cry that escapes is only too real, tears springing to John's eyes. “Bet I could make him come right here.”

“Let's not.” The doctor, his name long lost to John's uncaring memory, walks around behind John, cool hands brushing over his back, down along his ass. “The last thing I need is to explain why we had to drug every alpha in this wing to maintain order.” He comes back around to stare into John's eyes. “I think you're right though. No need to waste the shot.” 

“Then let's get this over with.” 

They push and pull him into loose, thin prison pants and a shirt, cuff his hands and the cold steel on his wrists is something real to hold onto, to push back even just a little against the rising tide of his own need. John twists his hands a little, presses against the bracelets at slightly different angles, wondering how the chill might feel somewhere else. He wriggles his toes in the thin rubber-soled slippers they jam onto his feet just to feel the scratch of canvas on his skin.

There aren't any shackles when they take him out of his cell. Just the thin metal circles around his wrists and the guards hands, guiding him past the cells of inmates he's never had the chance to see before. Most of the cell doorways are empty, the men in them sitting on their bunks, very obviously not looking at John and his escort as they walk past. There are a few who lean against the bars, leers and crude suggestions the only things John ever hears from them.

They make the trip in the back of a police van. It's full of nothing but the scent of John's heat over a layer of antiseptic that burns every time John takes a deep breath. He closes his eyes, blocking out the blank stare of the guard sitting across from him and drifts. The time passes in a haze, almost unnoticed as John lets the first real waves of the heat rush through him. It's wrong, too strong, the gentle warmth of the first hours of a normal heat supplanted by a rush of need and sensation that threatens to choke the very breath from John's lungs. 

He sways on the seat when they stop, doesn't move until the guard makes him. The hard hands on his shoulders help, a dull pain that cuts through the thickness of the air against John's skin. They stand and John stumbles when he climbs out of the van, one of the other guards catching him before he can hit the ground. It's dark out and when John looks up he can't make out the guards face, the people around him reduced to gray outlines. 

It's not far to the platform, erected long ago and used only for special offenders, itself nothing more than a dark blot against the blackness of the trees. There are lights above the tree line when John raises his head, the fog smeared sheen of office buildings a welcome respite from the platform that grows closer with every step. Gravel, hard and sharp beneath the slim protection of his shoes, gives way to grass that is long enough to tickle against John's bare ankles as they walk. 

John trips again, stumbling over the lip of a cement path he can barely see in the uncertain light. He lets the guards take his weight again, takes every chance he can get to look at the skyline. He can smell the city now, over the warm green life of the park around him, oil and burnt rubber and a flat taste in the back of his throat that always makes him think of metal. John manages to find the sharp edges of the 'L' on top of the LexCorp building and then one of the guards grabs him by the hair, forces his head down to stare at the worn wood of the pillar.

The guards pull him up the steps and John doesn't mean to fight them, means to stagger and whine and be nothing but a helpless omega for them. But as they push and pull him up the steps John finds himself shoving backward against their grips, leaning away from the platform, from the pillar in the middle and the ropes that he can see dangling from it.

“No.” John jerks against the hand in his hair, kicks at nothing to try and get the guards to release him. “No. Please don't.”

They hold him tighter, hands feeling as if they're digging straight through John's flesh into the bones beneath. The guards lift him for the last few steps, drag him across the wooden slats of the platform until they force him to his knees beside the rounded shaft. It doesn't take long for them to secure him, though executions like John's are rare, there's an ease to their movements that makes John shudder. Two men to hold him on his knees, one of them keeping a hard grip on the back of John's neck, making his skin flush, his legs quiver with unfulfilled need. 

John can feel panic and need rising and tangling inside of him as the ropes are tightened, rough weave burning around his wrists. One of them undoes the handcuffs and John is jerking hard against the rope without thinking about it, his breath rasping through his body, the sound of his ragged breathing drowning out everything else. The guards are leaving and John can feel that there's no fucking _give_ to the ropes, no way to untie himself. He's fucked, something's gone wrong and he doesn't need to scent the air to know that there are alphas out there, heading his way. 

He almost screams, in spite of the little part of him that knows it will do no good, will just attract the alphas faster, but then the retreating steps of the guards stop and there's a distant curse. There're words John can't make out and then a single jogging guard returns, his hurried pace making the platform shake as he takes the steps up two at a time.

John twists as far as he can, watches the shadowed form come for him. The guard is still faceless as he leans over beside John, one hand braced beside John's bound hands as he seems to search the platform. John almost misses it, the way the guards hand slips over the pillar until there's the too warm touch of skin against his own, a brushing contact that raises the hair all over John's body. The man moves quickly, an almost ridiculous sound of victory shouted in the air as the rope around one of John's wrists comes loose and the guard seems to snatch something up from beside John's knees.

“Found it!” 

John can't make out the grumbled response but it doesn't matter. He concentrates on grabbing the slipping, falling rope with his free hand, keeping it from swinging loose and giving them away. The guard beside him doesn't say anything, there's only a brush of fingers over John's shoulder and then he's gone, rattling steps down the short stair and then all sounds fade into the distance.

It's not quiet enough for John to be sure when the van leaves. Middle of the night, middle of the park or not, this is still Gotham and there is never silence. John is half sure that even if the world would come to an end the ghosts of Gotham would still be there, filling the void with the muffled beat of Gotham's heart.

He waits and hopes that it's long enough. 

The wind is faint, the gusts that cut through Gotham's streets buffered by the massive trees all around John. 

John waits, trying to scent the hint of a breeze that reaches him. There are sounds in the woods around him, noises too quiet to be people. The animals of the park slowly creeping our of their holes now that the last of the humans are gone. 

“Just us animals.” John's own voice is strange to his ears, low and drawn out. It rumbles in his chest unfamiliarly. 

He lets the loose rope fall from his grip and the sound of it slapping against the wooden post is jarring. John jerks and fumbles at the other rope until it begins to come free. There's a crash somewhere in the woods behind John's back, too loud and unnatural to be an animal. John freezes for a second, an instinct to stop and listen and hide taking over. 

Something like a howl cuts through the air, followed by the kind of drunk, raucous laughter that would send John hiding in his closet when he was a kid. It sends a different kind of shiver through him now, though the fear is there too, his heart hammering madly in his chest. John jerks his wrist free and the rope is still too tight, friction burning over his wrist and hand as he pulls loose. 

John hears more crashing through the trees behind him and there's noise coming from his left too, quieter but still coming closer. He pushes himself to his feet, the pillar the only thing holding him up as blood rushes back into his legs. The noises are getting closer and the hair on the back of John's neck goes up. He's already moving, staggering to the back of the platform, away from the stairs and the loudest of the crashing in the woods. 

He jumps off the back of the platform and he lands wrong, all arms and legs and uncoordinated stumbling in the thick grass of the hill. He hits something hard on the way down, a sharp thump that sends a spike of pain through his temple. The world spins and John just needs a minute to make it stop, to get to his feet. He needs time to find the skyline again, find the angular glow of Wayne Tower over the black line of trees. 

John can't wait any longer though, there are shouts now in the woods. Voices moving close enough that John can make out the hurled insults and snarls of alphas challenging one another. He has to move.

John struggles to his feet, shoes slipping in the damp grass. He thinks of scent trails and alphas out there in the dark, all looking for him. John curses, his heart trip-hammering in the back of his throat and he ducks down and scurries across the open field to the tree line. 

There's almost no light once John gets into the trees, and he's trying to run, to get ahead of the pack that he can swear must be right behind him. He trips every few steps, slips, cursing under his breath and stumbling through the dark. John flings his hands out in front of himself, dodging trees and branches that loom out at him from nowhere, every shift of his weight threatening to take his feet out from under him on the slick leaf litter of the forest floor. Something soft and round slips and slides out from beneath John's rubber-soled shoes and suddenly there's nothing solid beneath his feet, nothing to grab hold of, the thin branches he flails at snapping and slithering through his grasping fingers.

He lands in a ditch, dirt from the edge that had betrayed him raining down in wet clumps. There's water in the bottom, a thin, filthy sludge that soaks through John's shirt in seconds. It's freezing cold and it stinks, rotting plant litter and more noxious scents that turn John's stomach.

John lays there for seconds he knows he can't afford, fighting to get his breathing under control, to feel like he's really getting air. His head is spinning, sparks shooting across the black backdrop of the branches blocking out the night sky. John shifts, twists, trying to roll over and get up but there's a deep trembling in his stomach that threatens to spread to the rest of his body and every time he reaches for the edge of the ditch the dirt crumbles beneath his hands. 

“God dammit!” John's own voice seems to echo back to him from the trees, too loud, cracking as it drags out of his dry and broken throat. Something nearby growls, tiny and ferocious and there's a scurrying rustle through the underbrush but nothing else. John waits until the sounds fade, until he's sure that he hasn't brought any of the alphas looking for him down on his head and then he starts to crawl. 

This close the stench of whatever is rotting in the ditch is overwhelming and John's stomach clenches on nothingness, a hollow throb that wants to be sick but can't find the energy for it. He tries breathing through his mouth, but that only brings the rot deeper into his lungs and when he puts his hand down into something thick and slimy that gives away beneath him John has to bite back on a scream. 

He tries the edge again. It's still wet and crumbling but the ditch has shallowed enough that John manages to pull himself out, fingers slipping and scraping on tangles of roots. John can feel the roots shifting in the loosening soil, threatening to spill him back into the void of the ditch but it's only for a second and then he's up, out. 

The pants that they'd given him at the prison are torn up, filthy. He pokes at the holes in the knees, probes the bruised and chewed up skin beneath. Now that he's stopped he can feel minor pains all over his body, bruises and scrapes from his rush through the woods, cuts that sting in the open air. John wants to collapse against the tree behind him, wallow in his own suffering for a few minutes. His skin is itching though, a need that is sinking deeper and deeper into his flesh with every passing second and John knows that soon enough the minor pains will be lost to his heat. Just like his sanity.

John's running out of time.

He needs to find some clear sky, some way to find Wayne Tower again. John doesn't know how long Father Reilly's people will wait for him, doesn't know if he'll be able to make it if he doesn't keep going.

John starts moving, hoping it's in the right direction. He walks slowly, wanting to run but not willing to risk another fall. He knows he's been lucky so far. The woods have gone silent around him, what animals there are in the depths of Gotham falling quiet at his passage. It beats at him, a suffocating thickness that muffles his senses, leaving him alone in an island of nothingness. 

He walks into bushes covered in thorns, cuts himself on jagged branches that rear up at him out of nowhere. John's exhausted and shaking and there's only a part of him that can still think of things like scent trails and the blood and sweat that he's leaving behind him. Most of him is focused just on walking, on not dropping where he stands and giving up. 

John reminds himself with each step that there's a car out there waiting for him. That he's not alone. 

When he stumbles into the clearing it's a shock. He'd almost begun to believe that the woods were unending, that he was trapped in some nightmare he would never escape from. But there's the clearing, tiny and full of dead flowers as fall burns down into winter. The moon is out, a jagged break in what look like storm clouds, and John throws his head back, dragging in a deep breath. 

The air is almost still, the buffer of the woods cutting most of the winds that constantly howl through Gotham down to faint breezes. John smells nothing but himself, a sickly sweet mix of sweat and fear and the remnants of whatever had been in that ditch. He's not sure if he can't smell the alphas because they're too far away or just because the winds going the wrong way. 

He moves away from the tree line, towards the center of the clearing. There's a statue there on another small hill, overgrown with ivy and some sort of flowering vine. John half remembers it from a trip he and Kori had made to the park a lifetime ago. His memory supplies red flowers that mimicked a womans long hair, the ivy a gorgeous sweep of green dress.

John climbs the hill, his abused knees aching and then up onto the edge of the statues' pedestal, hands seeking the solid stone form beneath the dying plants to steady himself. It's just tall enough to let him see over the top of the trees. The city lights glow cold against the night sky and John turns quickly enough that he makes himself dizzy, looking for the top of Wayne tower. 

He finds it, finally, the sharp jut of the tower rising above the rest of Gotham. It looks close, closer than he'd hoped, and John jumps down from beside the statue, relief like a spike of adrenaline in his veins. John rushes forward over the clear ground, a strange sort of hope that he can make it out of the park without encountering any of the alphas, that maybe his luck will for once be good driving him forward. 

Hope nearly kills him in the end. 

The man comes out of nowhere, a pale blur to John's right that he barely has a chance to register before he's knocked to the ground, breath exploding out of him in a painful rush. John's first gasped breath brings the stench of the alpha to him, charred wood and cigarettes. The alpha laughs and leans in close, pinning John to the ground as he scents him, breath huffing in and out rapidly against John's bared throat. 

“Heh. Well look what I found.” The man sits back, leaning all of his weight on John's legs. “I was starting to think the whole thing was a joke. Thought maybe they'd kept you for themselves back at the prison.” He takes hold of John's chin in one hand, the grip rough and dismissive. “Fuckers obviously don't know what to do with an omega who's hot for it. You sure as shit don't let 'em go nowhere.”

“Get off me.” John sits up, hands splayed against the alphas chest and jerks his chin out of the mans grip. The alpha snarls and pulls back, just a fraction and John knows he's gearing up to punch John's face in, but the man is slow and probably more than a little stupid. 

John takes hold of the front of the alphas shirt and pulls him forward as hard as he can. In the same second John slams his head forward, ducking, and there's the sickening wet crunch of the hard curve of his skull jamming the alphas nose in the wrong direction. 

The man howls and the half-hearted grip he has on John's shoulders falls away as he clutches at the bloody mess of his face. John scrambles back, hands and ass and heels digging into the hard packed dirt. It's undignified and there's a tiny part of him that wants to giggle. Luckily the rest of his brain is far too busy putting some distance between the screeching alpha and himself to take much notice. 

John rolls to the side when he thinks he's far enough away, struggles to his feet and the back of his neck is crawling with goosebumps, sure that while his back is turned the alpha will be on him. But the man is still clutching at his face when John whips around, cursing in a voice thick with blood and pain. 

“You fucking little fuck I'm going to fucking-”

He's loud, too loud, and John finds himself beside the man without any memory of crossing the distance. The alpha reaches for John with a snarl, still on his knees, and John's growling back as he dodges the clumsy grip. He catches hold of the mans long, greasy hair with both hands, steady and sure now as he slams the ugly, swelling face down into his knee. 

The impact is a shock, jolting all the way up to John's hip, higher. He growls through the moan as his stomach twists, not sick, something much worse. It takes another two blows to knock the alpha into a whimpering, half-conscious puddle of blood and drool. John drops to his knees beside the weakly twitching body and rummages through his clothes quick and sure, old habits coming back as though he'd never left the streets behind. The mans shoes are far too large and the stench of the alpha pissing himself is enough to make John give up the thought of stealing his jacket.

John comes away with a switch-blade that is fancier than it needs to be. There are handcuffs too, buried in an inner jacket pocket, light and covered in some sort of faux fur. Ridiculous and nearly useless, unless your target is already beaten and weak. 

He kicks the alpha in the head, getting nothing but a convulsive full body twitch for his trouble and cuffs the unconscious mans hands behind his back. There's a bolt of pleasure and disdain that snaps through John's body and he knows he's still grinning, mad and achingly painful on his tired face. He licks his lips as he starts to hurry off, the tang of his blood mixed with the fallen alphas on his tongue. 

John spits the foul taste from his mouth and moves on, back into the trees. 

He knows he's running out of time, the hush of the woods around him unnatural. The animals are disturbed, hiding. The crunch of his own steps through the underbrush is the only sound, deafening in the otherwise silent evening. Somewhere far behind him John imagines the snarls and thuds of alphas fighting it out, wonders how many have managed to avoid the general brawl and move off into the woods for the actual hunt. 

John walks quickly, not quietly, there's no point anymore with the scent of blood rising up around and behind him and there's a hot, curling need at the thought of alphas in the woods with him. Scenting and hunting and John slams his fist into the rough bark of a tree at the thought that they had better be better than the one he's left beaten and bloody behind him. 

He can't stop the thoughts though, twisting through his mind and making him stumble, making him slow down. John presses fingers to his bruises to remind himself to keep going, to ignore the parts that the drugs have awoken. There's so much wrong, his brain swimming in a haze of need and blood pounding anger. He hurts himself as he walks until the pain stops fueling his anger, until the next throb is like a pulse of pleasure straight through his chest. 

“Damn.” It's a moan, soft and unsure and John finally stops moving forward, moving out. He leans against a tree, his weight shifting it just a bit, hollow and dying at his back. There's wetness trickling down his thighs, heating the cooled, damp fabric of his prison pants. He turns and sniffs at his back trail, faint downwind but strong enough for all that that there's no question he's being followed. John knows he needs to keep walking, he can't be that far from the edge of the park, from salvation. But his legs won't move. 

John reaches down into his pants, elastic waist digging at his arm as he fumbles at his cock, soft and shrunken out of the way for the moment. The pleasure is immediate, painful in his need. He fists himself, head back against the softly crumbling bark and whimpers, fights to draw himself back from the edge of desperation. 

There's a crack behind him, boots on fallen limbs and John's eyes fall to slits as he scrapes his own nails over his balls, the slickness that continues to leak from him blunting the edge of the pain. The alpha comes around him slowly and John watches him slink into view, barely visible in the haze of light that slips into the trees. This one is taller, broader through the shoulders and waist. Built like a brick shit house and John shifts his stance wider, nearly bites through his own lip as the tips of his fingers tease another pulse of pleasure from him. 

“You made a mess back there, darling.”

“I didn't like him.” John's mouth is on automatic, moving without any input from his brain. He forces his hand away, presses it to his stomach where he can feel the pounding of his pulse like a run away horse. 

“Might be you'll like me better.” The alpha steps closer, smirking, and there's a scar twisting down from one eye, cutting through his top lip. “I think you're about ripe, aren't you, sweetness?”

“No.” John grinds it out through clenched teeth, hands fisting. “Go away.”

“Awww...you don't really mean that. You're hot for it. I've been smelling you for miles now.” The man reaches up and rubs one hair over his short blond hair, eyes flicking to look at the darkness around them. “There's some rough men out here tonight. Hate to think of you meeting one of them. I'll treat you alright. Give you what you need.” 

“No.” John drags a long breath in and the alpha is close enough to smell now, sweet and stomach churning. He pulls his hand out from beneath his shirt, lets it drop to the side. His legs are still shaking, refusing to move. “Don't touch me.”

“Darling, you're just going to make this hurt.” The alpha takes the last couple of steps forward, grabs John's throat with crushing fingers before John can do more than drag in a startled breath. “You say 'no' to me again and I'll fuck you with a baseball bat. Might be you'd like that, slut. Omega's do like it hard and bloody.” He rocks his hips forward and John shudders at the rotten muskiness that wafts up around him. “I'm gonna teach you some fucking manners.”

John's mouth works, soundless, breathless and his vision is starting to spark around the edges, blackness eating away at the darkness of the woods. 

“What's that?” The alpha leans in closer, until his ear is pressing against John's lips. His chest presses against John's, rising and falling with ease as he scents John's neck, a delighted chuckle bursting out of him at John's weak struggles in his grip. “Good omegas get to breathe. You gonna be good for me?”

John slumps in his grip and the alpha lets go, as if he expects John to slither to the ground in a submissive heap. John staggers forward instead, and there's surprise in the alpha's widening eyes as he half catches John out of what must be instinct, hands coming up to Johns shoulders for a second. John swings his arm up, fist clenched tight around the knife and there's enough light to shine off the blade in flashes as John stabs it into the unprotected side of the alphas throat.

“No.” John's voice is little more than a whisper, hot pain blooming in his throat as he forces the word out again. He jerks the knife free and there's a hot spay of blood over his hand as he pulls away. 

The alpha stares at him, a snarl twisting his face and he's reaching for John again as if nothing has happened, as if he doesn't realize he's been stabbed. John steps back, heart dropping into his stomach. He tries to move around the tree and the alpha follows, a little too slow. John stabs out again, the blade nearly invisible in the darkness of the forest as it slices into the alphas outstretched arm.

“Y-” The word dies in a wet gargle and the alpha trips, eyes wide in confusion as his hands rise to his neck. John stills, watching as hands fumble, finding the slick spill of blood, the raw mouth of the wound John has slashed open. The alphas mouth works, blood bubbling up between pale lips to trickle down over his chin. 

“No.” John stays long enough to watch the alpha crumple to the forest floor, hands spasming against the wound in his neck, trying to stem the tide. He kicks helplessly in the dirt and John leaves him there without another word. Adrenaline buzzes through John's body, clears out some of the heat induced fog long enough for John to set himself moving in the right direction.

John loses track of time, loses everything but the feel of trees brushing his shoulders, the crack of branches and leaves beneath his feet. He staggers and stumbles forward, his body begging him to stop, to rest. John moves forward, one aching step at a time, fingers locked tight around the handle of his little knife. 

He walks into the fence and at first he doesn't know what's happened. John slumps against it, forehead pressed to the cold wire and stares out at the street, lights bright enough to burn his eyes. His vision swims as he turns his head, looks for a gate, a way out. There's nothing but a small clear space just wide enough for John to lay down in, if he wants to die on his back. 

“Climb.” John feels himself speak more than he hears it, tilts his spinning head back to look at the top of the fence, not that high, just a few feet over him and it's fine, he can do this. He's so close.

He climbs, fingers claws around the wire and he pants around the knife he's shoved between his teeth, unwilling to leave his only weapon behind. The drop to the ground on the other side is unplanned, his fingers refusing to answer him on the descent, shoes slipping and dropping from his numb feet. John manages to fumble the knife away from himself before he loses his last tenuous grip, eyes following the arc of its descent in the hopes of finding it again. 

The knife lands in a bush. 

John lands in broken glass. 

If he could think about anything except for escape and filling the gnawing ache between his legs, John's pretty sure he'd take that as a sign. The glass opens up dozens of wounds in his back, his arms and hands when he rolls, shielding his face. The gutter is clean, for Gotham, so close to the high rises and people who can't bear the sight of the trash they live in. John cracks his head on the edge of the sidewalk as he rolls to stop and his ears are ringing, vision flicking in and out of focus as he pushes himself to his knees. 

He crawls to the bushes where the knife had landed, and there are thorns, of course there are, but the knife hasn't fallen too far in and John hardly notices the long scratches that join his chorus of aches. He uses the fence to pull himself to his feet, clings to the shadows just out of reach of the nearest pool of streetlight and clenches his eyes shut. 

When he opens them again there is only one of everything, rather than three, and the street has stopped swaying like a rope in the breeze. John scans the street, looking for the car that should be there. There's nothing, only a single fat bodied motorcycle in one flickering puddle of light in front of Wayne Tower, gleaming red and vicious looking. He waits, holding his breath, eyes darting up the street again and again, straining to catch the sound of an engine coming his way. 

The street is an echoing canyon of distant horns and engines, sirens that make him flinch back into the shadows. But nothing comes closer. Nothing approaches but crackles and shouts from behind John, in the park. 

He doesn't understand, doesn't know who would betray the Father like this, make him fight only to leave him dead on the sidewalk. John spits, blood stinging the cuts inside his mouth and focuses on the motorcycle. 

There's a howl, more human than animal, too close to John. He steps out from his hiding spot, fights to keep his back straight as he crosses the street. He feels exposed, naked, and his ears pick out grunts and snarls and the stomp of boots growing closer. John hurries, tries to, but he hurts down to his soul, blood cooling on his exposed skin and the street seems to grow wider with each step he takes. 

He reaches the bike, bloodied fingers fumbling at the ignition, searching for a key. He knows it's not there, no one is that stupid, but he feels around anyway, mindless in his need for escape. 

“Hot wire it.” John presses his hands to his eyes, tries to drown out the shouts from across the street, the rattling of the fencing as alphas start to climb over it. “I don't remember how. I can't. There's no time.” His hands fall and he stares down at the worn leather of the seat. “Then you're going to die.” It startles John, to hear himself say it. He forces himself to look up, to watch the alphas come, six of them, and he nods, lips tightening in a bloody line. 

“Okay.” He brings the knife up to his own throat, hands steady again. John knows when the alphas see it, they break into runs but they're not fast enough, too far away and he starts to push. 

The first prick blooms into pain and then John's hands are clamped in a vice, immobile. He whines and it turns into a snarl as the knife is plucked from his fingers. John turns and the man beside him is massive, terrifying. John stares up and up, past the motorcycle leathers that cling to a mountainous form into his own face in the mirrored visor of a motorcycle helmet. 

“No!” John screams it, his throat tearing and he lunges for the knife held just out of reach. 

The man pushes him away, almost gently, and John finds his back against the cold glass of the building, his little knife dropping from leather covered fingers as the motorcyclist steps forward into the street. 

“Nice night, friend.” One of the alphas from the park steps a little in front of the pack, all stilled in the middle of the street and staring at the new player. “See you found something of ours. Troublesome little shit, but we hear he's got a nice tight-*glurk*” 

John thinks he must have blacked out, must have missed something because the motorcyclist is too huge to have moved so fast, to have crossed the space between himself and the pack to twist the speakers head around with a wet snap. But the alpha is on the pavement, twitching, eyes glassy and dying in the street light and the others are coming up around the silent stranger, knives and fists at the ready. 

John slides to the sidewalk, crawls to where his knife has fallen and it feels good to have it in his hands again, sticky and cold from the blood running down the handle. He moves back behind the bike, pries at the ignition with the tip of the blade, torn between watching the fight in the street and trying to remember how to steal the motorcycle. 

The stranger is outnumbered, five to one. It shouldn't be a fair fight. 

It's not. 

The alphas attack separately, or in pairs. Some of them might even know what they're doing, if John's fuzzy and fritzing brain can be trusted. The man hardly seems to move. They stab at him and he breaks their fingers, their arms, knives falling useless and forgotten to the pavement before he falls into stillness again. Waiting. Punches are taken in silence, the mask of the helmet unmoved as blows rain down on the leather clad body. The alphas might as well have been throwing pebbles for all the notice they get. 

John stares, unable to look away. He knows, on some level, that his legs have fallen open wide as he kneels beside the bike. That his every breath is a moan of excitement, waiting for the violence to break out. He can feel it when the biker looks back at him, nothing visible but a slight tilt of the shining mask. 

“Come.” The biker raises his arms, motions the alphas in with mocking gestures and they move together, but not as one. 

John digs his fingers into the leather of the bike's seat and gasps with pleasure at the beauty before him. It's a dance of violence and pain, the street echoes with the screams of alphas as they go flying backwards, to all sides, their limbs shattered, blood pouring from torn flesh and broken lives. The second man dies with his head smashed into the pavement, blood sluggishly puddling beneath him. The third and fourth alphas lose their lives in a splash of blood that fountains from torn throats, fingers clutching briefly at wounds that cannot be staunched. 

The fifth alpha makes a break for it then, curling one broken arm against his chest as he rushes at John. The biker has hefted the sixth man above his head, bringing the writhing, screaming form down over an upraised knee and John doesn't need the high pitched scream of despair to know that his back is shattered. The fifth alpha is wiry, eyes mad and desperate as he runs to John, an animal trying to escape. 

John doesn't think, hardly knows what he's doing until it's done, his knife buried deep in the mans inner thigh, dragging through the meat there until he slices free in a glistening arc, blood spurting out in the wake of his knife dark and heavy. Unstoppable. 

The man stares, staggers and falls to the sidewalk, his leg refusing to hold him up any longer. John licks lips gone dry as he watches the alpha bleed out more quickly than he could have imagined, whimpers falling from the dying mans mouth until the very end. 

When John turns away from the bloody corpse the biker is standing, still and silent as a statue on the other side of the bike. John catches a glimpse of his own reflection, eyes wide and needy, covered in blood. He looks away, focuses on the mans chest. The scent of alpha is so strong that it's a fight not to drop to his knees again.

“Give me your keys.” John's hand shakes but he raises the knife anyway. There's nothing else to do.

“You will crash before you can escape.” The voice is weird, echoing, but strong. 

“I'll make it. Someone's coming for me.” John can see the knife swaying in his grip, fingers tingling with growing numbness.

“More alphas, perhaps. No friends.” The man moves between one breath and the next and the knife is out of John's hands again, tossed to the middle of the street and lost in the carnage. “Let me help you.”

“No.” John steps back, shaking, hands coming up. The heat is thick in his throat, thrumming through him, drawing out more moisture, slick and sliding down his trembling legs. “Don't touch me.”

“I will not hurt you.” Hands rise, fingers spread in a false flag of harmlessness. 

John nods and he intends to step away, to run, but then he's on his knees, head in his hands and he's gasping, pain and raw need driving him there. The biker steps closer and John knows he's lost, the drugs and the heat coursing through his body and he wasn't good enough to get to live. 

“Pl- Go fuck yourself.” And then all thought is gone in the scent of leather and blood and John prays not to wake up ever again.

\---

Hell is softer than John had expected. 

He wakes all at once, eyes snapping open and then slamming shut at the pain of too bright sun cutting into them. John swallows back a groan, his mind sluggish and exhausted. He takes stock with his eyes still screwed tightly shut, trying not to move more than he has to. 

The mattress beneath him is firm, the sheets cool and soft where they haven't been heated by his own body. He turns his head and practically suffocates in an avalanche of pillows. There are towels and pads beneath his hips, when John stirs he can hear the crackle of plastic beneath the sheets. 

His body aches, cuts still burning when he touches them. John open his eyes and traces the constellations of healing bruises and cuts, struggling to gauge how many days he's lost. The scent of leather and blood is all around him, the scent of the last alpha, the victor, and John chokes on a sob that comes from nowhere, entire body convulsing with it. 

John fumbles one hand beneath the sheets, screws his eyes shut tightly again as if that will keep the truth from his mind. He's bleeding, that much is clear, sticky and foul against his thighs, but he doesn't know how bad the tearing is yet, doesn't know when his new owner will be back for more. He searches blindly and finds...nothing. 

He's sore, but it's all inside of his body, an ache that ebbs and flows with the pulse of his body, familiar in the aftermath of a heat. John can find no wounds, no evidence that- nothing to show that the alpha has- 

John wipes his hands on the sheets, pale blue where they're not now stained with his blood and forces himself to climb out of the bed. The room isn't much, bed and a small dresser with an unplugged tv sitting on top. A little bathroom off to one side, hidden behind a screen covered in brightly painted birds in flight. There's a pair of pajama bottoms hanging over the screen, soft beneath John's questioning fingers. He leaves them there for the moment.

There's enough light coming in from the small window set into the shower that John doesn't need to turn the lights on. He feels worse than he looks, which is something of a surprise. Still, he can see the purple-orange shadowed bruises of hands around his throat and there's a gash on his forehead that's been closed up with a neat line of stitches. John twists, contorting his body through the pains and aches that keep cropping up. There's nothing there that doesn't make sense, nothing that he can't remember getting. 

No bites. Which is...which doesn't mean anything, John reminds himself. It's tradition, it's instinct and habit but an alpha doesn't _have_ to bite. They just enjoy it. John leans against the vanity, forehead hot against the cool of the glass and closes his eyes again. He doesn't know what to do, can't find his footing in all the questions circling through his head.

“Good morning, Mr. Blake.” 

John startles at the voice, a squeak escaping him as his eyes fly open. He doesn't remember hearing a door, but there is a man in the bed room, close enough to be seen around the screen but far enough away that John doesn't immediately feel trapped in the bathroom. He's tall and lanky with a deep five o'clock shadow and the bearing of a solider at war. He's also very pointedly not looking at John. John sniffs and the man smells of the biker but he's too small, not enough bulk. “I- where am I?”

“A safe house, outside of the Gotham city limits.” The man moves toward the bed. John watches as he starts to strip off the top sheet that he'd bloodied. “We will need to get you further away, of course, but until the drugs had worked their way out of your system and you were stable I didn't want to risk it. How are you feeling?”

“Sore. Confused? There was- where is my- the- alpha?”

“No nausea? My brother Bane is the one who found you. He has some business elsewhere, at the moment.” The man smiles and there's kindness there, not entirely at odds with the hardness in his eyes. “He will return, but I feel I should reassure you that he is not _your alpha_. You were brought here after you collapsed in the street. I have been caring for you since then.” He bundles up the stained sheets and drops them into a ball near the far door. “Have you had any nausea? Dizziness?” 

“Why? Who are you? What-” John winces at the way his voice cracks. 

“Barsad. I would say it's a pleasure to meet you, but I think we both know that's a little uncouth. You hit your head, likely a couple of times. Nothing, I think, too damaging, but combined with the drugs that they used on you I have had some concerns. Unfortunately, until you came out of your heat it has been hard to judge the exact effects. So. Nausea?”

“Not...not yet? I just woke up and I haven't. Felt anything. Except sore.” John grabs the pajamas and steps into them, hissing as they drag over still raw bruises. 

“That's good.” Barsad sits on the edge of the bed, letting John decide how much distance to keep between them. John leans against the wall beside the bathroom door. “Now that you're awake, I'd like to keep an eye on you for a few more days, at least until you've gotten some food into you and stopped your cycle.”

“Will the alpha...will _Bane_...” John takes a deep breath. Braces himself. “I won't kneel for him. Just because he killed those guys.” 

“No one expects you to. Least of all Bane.” Barsad rubs at his chin, fingers scratching along the bristles there. “You are not a prisoner, Mr. Blake. You are our guest and we will do anything that we must to keep you safe.” He stands, walking slowly around the bed and back toward the door. “This is not locked. It never has been, though of course you may choose to lock it yourself, if you wish. There are necessities under the bathroom sink and I will bring something light up for you to eat, with some more suitable clothing.”

“Why?”

“You're more than welcome to walk around in what you have on, but I thought you might like some options.” Barsad smirks, one hand on the door handle. 

“You know what I-” John breaks off, shaking his head. “I don't believe you.”

“I know. Give us time.”


End file.
